How to turn off borderless printing and fix quality for print and cut projects

Someone on Reddit asked for help with this so I thought I'd make a quick tutorial! If you are trying to make your own labels or other print and cut projects for Cricut, Silhouette, Siser, etc. one of the common reasons the cuts do not line up is printer settings!

My computer is a windows machine, this will look different on Mac. As well, what these menus look like are specific to your printer brand, so you may have to look for similar options. My printers are an HP and an Epson for this tutorial (though I use many printers depending on what I'm creating!).

Turning off borderless printing and up your quality

When you hit "print" in a Windows program, usually a menu that looks like this pops up:

In Cricut Design Space, you first need to select the "use system dialog" toggle to see this menu, and you should always do this! In this example I'm using Siser's Leonardo software but this is what Cricut looks like before you open your printer options:

Select this on Cricut machines

After you open your printer properties/options you will see a variety of options specific to your printer. Here are 2 examples from HP and Epson:

To get the best quality and best cut, you want to ensure a few things:

• Change your paper type to match the kind of paper you are on, usually something that is not the default/plain paper setting! For me I use matte paper, so I typically select "other matte paper"
• Once you select other paper, you can usually increase the quality to something like "high" or "best" - do that!
• You need to ensure that your printer is not changing the print size, so if there are options to enlarge it should be off or if you see a percentage, make sure it is 100%. If your printer warns you that clipping or cropping may occur, that is okay! You want it to print in the exact dimensions your cutter software provides, which is the 100%. If it is not 100% your cut will be off.
• Finally, if your printer has a borderless setting, turn it off! This also acts to enlarge the print past 100% to hit the edges. The cutting software needs the image to be the exact size it thinks it is or else the cuts will be off.

HP:

Epson:

After you print with these options, you're set up for success! Just two last notes for the machines I have:

• For Cricut you load the mat as you always do, but make sure your page is very straight and aligned to the top left of the mat! If your cuts are still off, try a calibration using these printer settings!
• For Siser machines you can actually position print and cuts anywhere, but you need to manually move the camera so it is above the bottom left registration mark before you start your cut! You do this using the little screen on the machine. It's slightly annoying but you will get faster at it, and the benefit is that Siser cuts are so much more precise than Cricut!

I hope this helps! If you have questions feel free to comment here or shoot me an email. And if you're trying to make your own Yoto labels, always remember I can just make them for you ;)